Hunting Green in the Mountains

The battle for the green jersey has slimmed down to three legitimate contenders, after an opening week that’s already seen half of the Tour de France sprint stages decided.

Liquigas-Cannondale sensation Peter Sagan leads with 217 points, followed by Orica-GreenEdge’s Matt Goss with 185, and Andre Greipel of Lotto-Belisol at 172.

Greipel, however, has been sitting out of intermediate sprints and focusing solely on stage wins, leaving Goss as Sagan’s only challenger.

While Goss hasn’t claimed a Tour stage win, he has the benefit of three-time green-jersey winner and Orica-GreenEdge coach Robbie McEwen in his corner.

Which stages are they targeting? “All of them,” snaps McEwen. “All of them Gossy can finish.”

The Aussie team has also been putting up a tough fight for the intermediate sprints, committing at least three riders to their leadout to pick up points remaining after the breakaway has rolled through.

The contest for intermediate sprints, previously ignored by green-jersey hopefuls in all but the closest battles, became a significant factor in 2011. In previous editions, intermediate sprint points (6, 4, and 2) went only to the top three riders, but now the first across the line receives 20, with points going back 15 places.

Despite the burden of supporting Vicenzo Nibali’s general classification hopes, and Sagan’s stage finishes, the Italian team still commits Oss and Slovenian racer Kristijan Koren to work for Sagan on the intermediates.

Oss is confident in Sagan’s chances to hold the green jersey all the way to Paris. “If he can just get seconds and thirds,” Oss says with a smile, “he’ll be good.”